Cotton: The Fabric of Their Lives

The curating process was very difficult. My group, group E, were given 6 sources, some illustrations of things like a cotton mill and a common machine of that time, a drawing of a slave in an hour glass with the factory and its money at the bottom, a world map of cotton movement, a graph showing slavery statistics in the US, and a grid of the growth of slavery and production of cloth throughout 24 years. From these recourses our exhibit focuses on the growth of slavery which lead to the growth of production of the mills. The title of our exhibit is "Behind the Scenes" because during the Industrial Revolution the slaves were really the reason why the mills were so successful; but the mills got all the money and recognition. I hope that visitors that see my exhibit see that there was a big growth of the slave population during this time and that because of all these slaves picking cotton it was possible to mass produce textiles.

Including my group, there were a total of 5 groups who had the same mission; analyze the sources and share the information through an exhibit. Here is what I learned from each exhibit.


Group A-
Group A's title is "Tearing Down Families." During the Industrial Revolution factories were outshining family production, so they had to go and move near the mills to work and get money for the family. Families became poor because they now had less money then had before the Revolution.


Group B-
"All Aboard" is about the invention of the steam locomotives. With this new and faster form of transportation people could work and buy goods from far away places.


Group C-
This exhibit talked about the amazing progress and accomplishments England had during the Industrial Revolution, and with these advances came an increasing cost of living. This exhibit was titled "Progress has a Price".


Group D-
"Stolen Childhood" is about the children during the Industrial Revolution and the terrible work conditions they faced. Children at an early age had to do demanding physical labor that caused deformities and strain of the body.